Days 12, 13 and 14 - every breath is a new opportunity

Photo by Michael S. Wright

Thursday night I got home late and blogger was down, then yesterday I left my house at 6.40am and didn't get back until nearly 1am. It has been a busy few days. Some of the time I have felt overwhelmed. Taking on 'too much' has always been a challenge for me, but, what exactly is that tipping point into 'too much' is something I have not figured out yet. It seems to shift and change all the time and, just as I think I have found some semblance of balance, life throws a ball out of left field.

Slowly (sometimes so slowly that it seems I have come to a halt), I am learning to let go and open my hands rather than grasp so tight. I am trying to let go of expectations, fantasies of what I want something to be, and, mostly, I am trying to let go of the fear that there won't be enough, that if I don't get this, right here and now, there may never be this (whatever this might be in the moment) again. I can trace where the grasping comes from, but that doesn't matter. Sometimes, no matter how much I understand something with my rational brain, I need to understand from my bones. That is why I am also striving for kindness towards myself. There was a time when I kept berating myself when I held on tight, because I should know better. It didn't help. What I needed in those moments was acceptance and love, not a scalding. I have had enough pushing and shoving to last me for this lifetime. What I still need when I am scared is not to tell myself than I need to let go, to be brave and make myself unfurl my tight metaphorical fists. What I need in those moment is to see the fear, to tell myself that it is understandable and to know that it is ok. When I can do that, when I hold myself with love and compassion, that's when I know that there is always more, and that there is always enough, that is when my hands open, and I breathe into the discomfort to find so much more space than I could ever have dreamt of.

When I can do that, it doesn't matter if blogger is down, if I have not done all the things I wanted to do before a meeting, or if I get an unexpected text from a person who cracked my heart open again, not so long ago. When I know that there is always enough, and that there is always more than I could ever need or want, it doesn't matter that I am not perfect, or not even close to it. When I breathe into those moments, and my hands open, then my heart does too, and I know, deep in my gut and my bones, that all there is it's this perfect moment. This perfect, awkward, sometimes painful, sometimes joyous moment, which is gone already by the time I wish it away or grasp at it. All I have to do is show up, and be present to this moment before it's gone.